Gary lay on his bed staring at the ceiling, which stared back with complete indifference.

The pain had crept in while he slept. Not dramatically. Not urgently. Just steadily, confidently—like it had booked a long weekend and wasn’t in a rush. His jaw throbbed in a slow rhythm that suggested the infection had unpacked.

He swallowed and winced.

This was fine, he told himself. People slept off worse things. Hangovers. Bad decisions. Entire festivals. Surely a tooth could be ignored for one more night.

He rolled onto his side. That hurt. He rolled back. That hurt too.

His phone buzzed on the bedside table. A pub message he’d missed earlier. Someone had sent another photo of the dentist girl, laughing mid-conversation.

Gary stared at it longer than necessary.

He could stay here. Lie still. Hope for a miracle. Become a warning. Or he could accept that whatever he was doing was clearly not working and try—finally—to intervene.

The pain pulsed again, aggressively, as if voting.

Gary sighed through his nose and made a decision.

What does Gary do?

Try to sleep it off again → Page 19

Drag himself to the pub anyway → Page 13